


A Green and Yellow Basket

by elistaire



Category: Highlander: The Series
Genre: F/M, Humor, M/M, Multi, Picnics, Tea, sex pollen/tea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-09
Updated: 2016-07-09
Packaged: 2018-07-22 13:18:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,503
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7440703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elistaire/pseuds/elistaire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While anxiously awaiting MacLeod to return from a challenge, Methos and Joe drink some iced tea from a gift basket Amanda left in the fridge. The "Amore Tea" keeps them busy.<br/> <br/><i>Methos held out the bottle.  "It was in the fridge so it's nice and cold.  Refreshing.  Aren't you thirsty?"</i></p><p>  </p><p>  <i>"Fine!  Fine, fine."  Joe grabbed the bottle and twisted the cap off.  It gave a little hiss and mist rose from the top of the neck.  He took a swig and licked his lips.  "What is this stuff?"</i></p><p>   </p><p>   <i>"I don't know." He turned the bottle around and looked at the label.  "No ingredients."  He squinted.  "And in really minuscule type it says no more than one bottle per day. Bizarre."</i></p><p>   </p><p> </p><p>  <i>Joe tasted it again.  It reminded him of lemonade in the summer, sour and sweet, and perfectly thirst quenching.  "Whatever it is, I like it.  We'll have to ask Amanda how to get some more."</i><br/></p>
            </blockquote>





	A Green and Yellow Basket

**Author's Note:**

> The tea made them do it. :) So there is an element of non-con, but I don't think they mind. 
> 
> Originally posted in 2006.

The loft, when they entered, was as quiet as a church.

“Not here yet,” Joe said and both he and Methos hung at the entryway area even though they’d been inside a thousand times before and should have been comfortable entering.

Methos cast him a look and forged ahead. “Then we’ll just wait for him. He’ll be along shortly.”

“You hope,” muttered Joe to himself and Methos sent him another dark look. Joe sighed and made himself comfortable. They might have a while to wait. He just wished he’d been informed of the Challenge sooner so he could have followed MacLeod out of town. It wasn’t every day that such an enemy as Richard Houde came from MacLeod’s past to stir up trouble and…well, maybe it was every other day with MacLeod.

Joe watched Methos prowl the loft, poking his nose into cubbyholes and plucking items off shelves to weigh them in his hand. Poor guy. Joe wasn’t sure he was exactly used to it, even given that as a Watcher he’d waited out quite a lot of battles in his years, but until recently he’d never had a vested interest in who won or lost. He’d rooted for His Charge and had always hoped a Good Immortal won, but he hadn’t been _attached_ before. And Methos certainly had a vested, _attached_ interest. Joe spent a few moments musing about the burgeoning relationship between the two Immortals, but decided it might be too prurient of him to ask how far along things had progressed.

“Thirsty, Joe?” Methos suddenly asked.

“Yeah, a little,” Joe admitted and pushed himself upright. “Let’s see what the ol’ snoot has available.” He opened the door to the fridge. 

Methos leaned in next to him. “Ho, ho! What’s this?”

“This,” Joe said in his best caricature voice, “is a pic-a-nic basket, Boo Boo.”

The basket was large and traditional, made of a honeyed-yellow wood with a lid and green checkered fabric peeking out about the sides. It took up much of the interior of the fridge and left room for little else. They took it out and set it aside. While Joe perused the rest of the contents of the fridge he could hear Methos cataloguing the items in the basket.

“Caviar, Joe! The good stuff. And smoked oysters. A very expensive brand.” Joe could hear more rummaging. For his part, the only items remaining in the fridge were a milk carton containing only dregs that smelled spoilt, a few bottles of chilled white wine, and a bottle of prune juice with an expiration date months overdue. “Pomegranate and sea holly preserves. Chocolate truffles. And--“ With a flourish Methos brandished a bottle. “Genuine Amore Tea.”

“Very amusing,” Joe said. “Nothing in there to drink.” He thumbed toward the hapless fridge. 

Methos put the drink bottle back and turned to the cabinets. “Tea? Coffee?” He rummaged around and managed to come up with an empty tin of pre-ground no-name coffee, a cocoa tin with the cocoa hardened into an unbreakable brick, and three tea bags scrunched into the corner of a cupboard, filled with as much dust as tea leaves.

“Ugh.” Methos wrinkled his nose at the offending tea bags before chucking them in the waste.

“Don’t throw those out!” Joe chided. “We’re going to want them in a minute.”

Methos rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I guess there’s nothing for it, Joe. We’re down to tap water, white wine, or breaking into MacLeod’s liquor cabinet.”

“It’s eight o’clock in the _morning_ , Methos,” Joe protested. “It’s a bit early for me. I think water will be just fine.”

“Or--" Methos swung around and pointed at the basket. 

"Naw. We shouldn't. It looks like a gift."

Methos threaded through the items again. "Sure. A present for me. See, look." He waved a card in the air before reading it. "Duncan darling, I'll be arriving on the fourteenth. Then you and I and our mutual old friend can all go on a picnic. Together. XOXO, Amanda."

"Old friend?" Joe crossed his arms and gave Methos his best rock-hard stare. Methos shrugged, unfazed. "The fourteenth is today," Joe tried again. 

"And Amanda isn't here. Neither is MacLeod. So we might as well enjoy. Besides, there are six bottles here. If we each have one, there'll still be four left. Plenty to drink when we go picnicking." Methos accentuated the last word as if he went picnicking all the time and it was entirely droll. "Besides, there's no champagne here whatsoever. With a love basket like this, the singular item that should be present is the bubbly." Methos held out the bottle. "It was in the fridge so it's nice and cold. Refreshing. Aren't you thirsty?"

"Fine! Fine, fine." Joe grabbed the bottle and twisted the cap off. It gave a little hiss and mist rose from the top of the neck. He took a swig and licked his lips. "What is this stuff?"

Methos took a long drink from his bottle, long throat working, and Joe stared for a moment at his Adam's apple. He'd never seen a more perfectly formed Adam's apple.  
"Hmm. I don't know. Tastes fruity and sort of like honey. Or maybe maple? Apples?" He took another quick drink. "Definitely cinnamon. No, not cinnamon…." He turned the bottle around and looked at the label. "No ingredients." He squinted. "And in really minuscule type it says no more than one bottle per day. Bizarre."

Joe tasted it again. It didn't seem like any of those things. It reminded him of lemonade in the summer, sour and sweet, and perfectly thirst quenching. "Whatever it is, I like it. We'll have to ask Amanda how to get some more."

"When she gets here," Methos said, staring at Joe like he'd grown a second head.

"What are you staring at, geezer?" Joe asked.

"What? Oh, nothing. I was just--nothing. Just thinking." Methos drank more of the tea. "About MacLeod. Just wondering. Worried. You know how it is."

"If something had happened, I'd have gotten the call," Joe said, and really he wasn't that worried. MacLeod could take care of himself, he did it all the time, he'd done it for four hundred and some odd years. The man was a veritable expert at taking care of himself. "There's nothing to worry about."

A peculiar dreamy expression was in Methos' eyes and Joe thought he sort of liked it when Methos looked dreamy. He liked it when Methos looked all hard and angular too, of course, but dreamy was just as nice. Maybe better. "Yeah," Methos said, even dreamier than he'd been a moment ago. "Nothing to worry about. I mean, we're here and there's nothing we could do about it anyway. Right?"

"Right," Joe agreed. He drank down more tea. 

"I never noticed before," Methos suddenly said, apropos of nothing, "how interesting your hair is. Sort of silvery and darkish all at once." He reached out tentatively and brushed his fingers through Joe's hair, giving Joe goose-bumps.

"Thank you." Joe touched the spot that Methos just had and then reached out and rubbed the back of one knuckle down Methos' cheek. "I always sort of thought it must be nice to be Immortal. Soft skin all the time, no need for moisturizers and all that junk."

Methos licked his lips and grinned wickedly. "I've got softer skin than my cheek, Joe. Want to see?"

"Yeah…."

It took a minute to rationalize mussing up MacLeod's bed, but the guy wasn't even there to be using it, so Joe thought it would be all right just this one time. And as Methos so eloquently pointed out, they'd clean up after themselves and MacLeod would be none the wiser. Besides, really, the couch was just too small for this sort of thing. MacLeod wouldn't want them--well, Joe in any case--pulling a back muscle because they'd been relegated to the couch instead of the bed, like any good host would have offered, and MacLeod was an exceptional host, so it made perfect sense. They used the bed. 

The next thing Joe could figure was that it must have been early afternoon because the sun had that particular golden slant to it, not that he actually cared what time it was as long as Methos was still in the bed, because Joe felt _fine_. And he fully intended to continue the recent developments and extend this utterly _fine_ feeling of his, if only someone would stop using the damned lift. The thing was far too creaky.

"Noisy," Methos said and snuggled in against him, skin warm and dry, and smooth everywhere. He hadn't just been teasing about how soft his skin was in certain places--

"Joe? Methos? What-- Joe! Methos!"

Joe grumbled at the intrusion but diligently focused on the interruption at the foot of the bed. There stood MacLeod looking completely trashed. His clothes were rent and torn, he was holding up one shoulder of his sweater, and he was puffing out his cheeks in that flabbergasted way he had when trying to come up with words about a certain situation. It took a moment, but then he finally found the beginning of his torrent.

Joe didn't mind. Methos was doing something very clever beneath the covers and he wasn't paying too much attention.

"…in my bed…fighting for my life…thought we had something special…look at me when I'm talking to you…." MacLeod paused long enough to fish through his refrigerator. He came out with one of the Amore bottles which he banged down on the counter hard enough that Joe thought the bottom should have shattered. Damn shame, too, he thought. That was tasty stuff. 

MacLeod glared at them both and took a swig from the bottle, which wasn't actually broken. "And another thing," he started to begin his ranting again but paused. He took another gulp of tea and stared at the bottle. "This stuff," he said wonderingly, "is really good. It tastes like, like, like something…."

He stopped his berating and approached the bed, finishing the tea off. "The thing I've always liked about that bed," he said, "is how large it is. California King. I have to order the sheets special from a company."

"This," Methos agreed, having come up from the blanket-depths, "is a fabulous bed. You should be commended for purchasing it. It is absolutely perfect. Want to give it a bounce?"

MacLeod sat down at the very end and gave a little bounce. "That _is_ nice."

"It bounces better up this way, pal," Joe chimed in, just in case MacLeod's reluctance to move further up had anything to do with his presence.

Macleod didn't need any further encouragement. He bounced his way up the bed and showed them both the finer points of a California King with 400 thread-count premium Egyptian cotton sheets. 

The next time Joe spent any energy thinking about something that wasn't involved in bouncing or how good it felt to rub against the sheets was when Amanda finally arrived. 

The loft had turned a cool grey-blue color as day faded into night outside, and both MacLeod and Methos had stiffened slightly and turned expectantly towards the door, so Joe'd settled back to watched the entrance. He had MacLeod to the left of him and Methos on his right--so they could keep at least one hand free to grab the swords they'd finally remembered to put near the bed--and was feeling very comfortable and that feeling of utter _fineness_ had settled into his bones and muscles. He'd explained earlier to MacLeod their theory about couches and pulled back muscles and MacLeod had seen how reasonable such deductive logic had been right away. 

"Sorry I'm so late, the traffic was just _awful_ ," Amanda said as she breezed in. She saw the three of them in bed and paused for the merest moment, only noticeable by the hitch in her shoes clacking on the floor. "Well, I see the three of you got into the basket I sent up." She pulled off her skimpy jacket and hung it on the rack, giving a lithe stretching twist with her hands on her hips. "I detest sitting still for so long. Kinks up the spine." She clicked on a lamp as she strolled over to the kitchen area and retrieved the remaining three bottles of tea. Blithely she opened one and drank down half. "Hmm. I never can decide what I think this tastes like." She set the other two bottles on the bedside. "Refreshers for later." She smiled. "Mind if I join?"

MacLeod simply pulled open the covers and Amanda crawled in. 

After that, Joe got a little hazy about everything. His world turned into an amalgam of smooth skin and mingling scents. Everything he wanted and anything he desired was satisfied, and when he thought there wasn't anything left to do or to feel and he could just melt down into contentment and satiation, one of them would remember something from times past or imagine something hitherto untried and he'd find himself caught up in another tumult of activity. His insides were like liquid and not that he could have managed to maintain a hold on a pencil, but he supposed he should write something down--for posterity, naturally--about the new definitions of gratification and satisfaction as he now understood them. Or write a song maybe. Definitely a song. A blues song, except _happier_.

It was getting quite late, at least well past dinner time, which was becoming confusing because he was hungry, but the trouble was that acquiring food meant leaving the sovereign nation of the bed, and he wasn't sure he was really hungry enough for that.

"There are still things in the basket," Methos suggested. "Octopus or something."

"That sounds good," MacLeod said and they delegated him to trek across the vast lengths of the loft to retrieve the sustenance. Before he went on his selfless humanitarian mission, they decided maybe one more go-round might be needed to help him through the ordeal. 

After about two minutes of which the three Immortals in the bed with him groaned and grabbed for their swords. Then Richie walked in. 

"Whoa." Richie stared across the loft, mouth open. "Whoa," he said again. "I think I might just have had an aneurism."

"Richard!" Methos called joyfully and snagged the one remaining, and still unopened, bottle of Amore tea from next to the bed. "Catch!" 

Richie caught the lobbed bottle and stared at it. "Iced tea? You guys are drinking _tea_? What, did you run through MacLeod's entire stash of booze?" He held his hands palm up at arm's length, eyes scrunched closed. "Wait, wait. No, never mind. I don't even want to know." He waved. "Good bye, good night. Let us never, ever, _ever_ speak of this again." He twisted the top off the bottle and guzzled heartily as walked out the way he came.

Amanda giggled. "He'll be back."


End file.
